106 THE FLORIST AND 



or five in the whole extent of our country. Rafmesque, by believ-* 

 ing in the various follies of the day, and led aside by writings which 

 fell into his hands and by the false statements which he collected 

 from different quarters., made forty-one species of this genus, the 

 most of which he had never seen. Although able to investigate 

 and describe as well as any naturalist of his day, he was led astray 

 by an insatiable desire of making new species, and appropriating to 

 himself every thing that he saw or even heard of in natural science, 

 he gave names to many things which never existed, and furnished 

 accounts of them as if he had had them in his possession. Altho' 

 his lucubrations are little worthy of notice, I have endeavored to 

 identify as many of these Numerous species as possible, and to re- 

 duce them to some degree of certainty 5 guided as well by what 1 

 remember to have seen in his possession, as by the short, and, in 

 many instances, very imperfect descriptions found in his American 

 Manual of Grape Vines ; some I have not been able to determine, 

 but scarcely think them different from others already well known. 

 The number of species now recognized in systematic works is not 

 more than five or six. I have increased this number considerably; 

 with what propriety is for others to judge. 



In my wanderings through our country, I have, I think, seen two 

 more species, but have no memoranda of their characteristics which 

 allow me to say more than that one was observed in the middle re- 

 gions of Georgia, which bore grapes of a tolerably large size, in 

 clusters of such density that the berries were pressed into a cubic 

 form. The other was a small grape, of which the inhabitants of 

 the upper part of North Carolina made a considerable quantity of 

 pale reel wine. This may be the Y. cordifolia of Michaux, which 

 species I have not been able to determine. The description of the 

 last species, Y. palmata, is taken in a great measure from recollec- 

 tion, and not from a late examination. 



By the word racemus or raceme, I wish to be always understood 

 to mean the bunches of mature fruit, the true and legitimate mean- 

 ing of the Latin word. 



1. YiTis labrusca. Foliis lato cordatis, sublobato-angulatis, aut 

 quinque-lobatis, acuminatis, irregulariter eroso-dentatis, supra gla- 



